I've been using vanishing cream for a few years now and it's helped me alot as my face was an oily spotty mess, it's still a biut of a spotty mess but the oil is gone.

Don't know if anyone wants to hear the reviews of the perfumes? Needless to say they are all amazing(although I really didn't like the smell of twilight but apparently it was accurate to ballistic scent).

Day of the dead - Smells amazing, lots of people have said it smell slike lady catrina but I havent' smelt that so I can't say, I have had a calavera and it is similar but much sweeter to me

Black pearl - This is so scrummy, to me it smells like spacegirl, it has a nice blackcurannt smell but there is something else as well that i can't put my finger on.

Snowcake - Exactly like the soap

American cream - just like the conditioner, this is my favourite one, it smells fantastic and I just wish I'd bought 2

So white - to me it smells like dettol apple scented floor cleaner but alot of people have said it smells like the ballistic

Twilight - just like the ballistic

Big - I didn't get this but apparently it's accurate to the shampoo.

I also hate the smell of almost all of the retro I bought, good thing it was so cheap

I want to get my boy something from lush for christmas, wanted the cosmetic lad gift set but cosmetic lad itself has lavender in it which certainly isn't good for him as he is epileptic. Would any of you have any recommendations for the boys? He loves the shaving creams but would maybe like to make up my own wee set for him so would greatly appreciate some more ideas!

My boy doesn't really use cleansers cause he has pretty much perfect skin (grr, lucky!) and he doesn't really like baths lol. was thinking some shaving cream, a massage bar and a serum but not sure >.<

I've just put 3 Gingerbread House bubble bars into the bath and I'm going to top it off with a Winter Bath ballistic. There are definitely perks to working at Lush (broken bubble bars being a big one).

I think I must be doing something wrong with the sugar scrubs. I had one a while ago but it scratched the hell out of me so I binned it. I got one in a gift and had another go and its the same again. Massive scratches all over my body, I look like I've taken on a tiger!

I'm following the directions, has anybody else had this problem?

On the plus side though, I also got Mandarin's Tea Party soap which is honestly totally gorgeous.

woolhairhabit wrote:I think I must be doing something wrong with the sugar scrubs. I had one a while ago but it scratched the hell out of me so I binned it. I got one in a gift and had another go and its the same again. Massive scratches all over my body, I look like I've taken on a tiger!

I'm following the directions, has anybody else had this problem?

On the plus side though, I also got Mandarin's Tea Party soap which is honestly totally gorgeous.

I do something similar to Bomber. I break a few smaller chunks off before getting into the shower and they crumble it and mix that in my hand once I'm in and then rub. I break the bits off before the shower cos it just dissolves otherwise!

Enchanted foaming sugar scrubs are perfect, they are scrubby without being scratchy(plus they are cleansing) and you can get them in all sorts of scents, good alternative to lush scrubs which I've found far too harsh!

Did anyone get anything in the sale? I got myself a fair few bombs / bbs and Kyoko picked up a gingerbread tin, I'm a bit miffed with myself for not getting the forum hatbox, it was the OH's birthday so I couldn't get on all day and silly me thought it was like a normal forum party and you could order up to 10pm.

Has anyone tried the Valentine's products yet? I had a Frog Prince in my bath tonight and it was gorgeous. Really heady but also quite fresh.

The Love Birds soap isn't my thing scent-wise (vanilla & jasmine so quite sweet but very subtle) but it's inoffensive and it lathers beautifully, really creamy. The Magic Mushroom I fell totally in love with last year so I'm VERY happy it's back

Birthdays was the worst days, now we sip champagne when we thirstay.....

I bought some of Lush's solid perfume in "Breath of God" and I'M NOT SUFFERING A SKIN REACTION.

I'd like to add that I have really, really sensitive skin which gets red and irritable on products that are usually labelled "sensitive" (I've even had problems with Johnsons baby soap! Erk!). A couple of years back, my sister bought me a load of Lush goodies for Xmas and they all bought me out in a really bad, red, itchy skin thing. I can't remember the products but I'm sure Snow Fairy was one of them :-/ I tried again a few months later and still, the same problem.

Today, I went in, first time in about a year and a half, tried on the perfume stick and it's great! Fingers crossed ladies, hopefully my skin issues have gone meaning I can wear LUSH! My holy grail! ^_^

I am disillusioned enough to know that no man's opinion on any subject is worth a damn unless backed up with enough genuine information to make him really know what he's talking about. - H.P Lovecraft

Not 100% sure whether the phone lines are involved but Santander are cancelling all cards used to purchase from Lush whether online or over the phone, other banks may follow suit so a quick heads up for you all.

Well Lush have said it's between those dates but there are a few of us over on the forum that have only ordered over the phone that have had fraudulent use, whether that's related to lush or not we don't know but you never know.

Important thing to look out for are payments to O2 and / or xbox live, so I'd check your account as they are test payments before they try a larger amount. This was the last update from Lush;

hilary@Lush wrote:
I've been in on some meetings today to clarify what I can and can't say at this stage.
It isn't because we are trying to hide anything - just that we don't want to jeopardise anything or step too far from the advice we are given.

So some things that we can say and might be helpful to know:

These hackers typically operate from a core of countries across the world, hack, then sell the data on.

The criminal buyers can use that data immediately or can hold on to it for some time ( sometimes for many many months, we are told ) before attempting to use it.

They often do small test purchases, then go on to do larger ones if these clear unchallenged.

Regarding the questions about the type and nature of hacking that we have had :
Until the full external forensic investigation has been done, which we set into motion after the events over Xmas, we will not be able to answer the questions regarding the dates, type of hacking and data theft that has happened. Our web team have done their bit, but we do not want to preempt the full results of the proper investigation. It will be a PFI investigation, which will go to our web team and the banks and credit card companies and will help us know the full details of the breach and learn from it for our new website.

We first became aware of website problems on Xmas Day. By Boxing Day we were aware of unauthorised entry and immediately took the website down. It remained down until extra security had been added and 24 hour monitoring put in place, including direct mobile phone alerts to our webteam.

We did not know that the entry to our site had been credit card data related, we merely knew that someone had entered the site - which did not necessarily mean data had been compromised. We initially took the site down on Boxing Day because any entry was enough for us to not continue trading on it until assessment had been made.

The first reports to us of fraudulent credit card use came from our French customers on a thread in this forum. We asked for full details to be emailed to us so we could investigate and take this further.

Up until Tues of this week, we had 43 customers email a report of fraudulent use of credit cards to us. First official confirmation of these definitely having come from transactions on our website was received this week.

Once we knew the data was from transactions through our website, we wanted to act quickly to ensure that we did everything we could to prevent this happening to any further customers.

We decided that the website should come down again until the external security audit could be completed.
We sought advice from various experts in this field and were told, by more than one agency, that removing the website is not normal procedure in our circumstances. Taking our website down and going public was described to us as 'an unusual and courageous decision' and that it is 'not unusual to trade on through' and say nothing as many companies fear the 'loss of face'.

The Oct to Jan warning date has been decided because we wanted it to cover a larger period than we think has been exposed. We hope we are erring very much on the side of caution here. We would rather notify more customers than required, than find out in retrospect that we had narrowed it and missed people.
The reason the warning date was extended forward to Jan since the first announcement was because one customer has come back to us reporting a fraudulent use of a card that was used on our site in Jan ( since the extra security was added ) and again, we did not want to take any risk of under warning other customers.
The window of time that our banks are reporting back to us of confirmed fraudulent transactions on cards is very much shorter than these dates - but again, we do not want to sit back and rely on the current reports being the whole picture.

Once it was confirmed that we were a source of data compromise, we wanted our customers to be able to talk to their banks and cancel cards if advised - and thereby be able to avoid the disruption to their lives. Since our email alert went out (to all customers between Oct and Jan) we have had lots of customers come back to us and say they have checked their statement after reading the email, and spotted small test usage. Some on here are also reporting larger purchases appearing on their statements. Our French customers too have been subjected to large purchases. Each and every one of these is genuinely heartbreaking to us and we would never wish to have had this happen to you through our website.

We do not have full information on the numbers affected, because we only know of the ones who have reported back to us. Meanwhile, the banks will be compiling a full list of fraudulent uses tracked back to us.

We will be looking very hard at the external report to prevent any future weaknesses and have booked external checks of the new website that was currently under construction before this recent crisis hit. So we have two things happening - external companies looking back over the past website to see where and how the breach happened, and also looking forward at the new website before it goes live to check for future robustness.

I think this answers most of the outstanding questions that I have spotted in this and other threads. I hope you understand that we are trying to give as much info as we safely and accurately can. All of you on here know Big, Tony and myself and will understand that over the last few weeks holding back from telling stuff has been the hard thing, as we have waited for events to unfold and confirmation to come back. It is a relief to finally be able to put more of the info out here.

Tony has been on the phone to me this evening to say that he is without internet access but wanted me to say to you that he is sorry that all the back scene stuff has kept him away from the forum today, but that he will make sure he is at Mail Order all day tomorrow near a phone should anyone need him.

Thank you all again for the support you have shown us this week. I hope you realise that we really don't take you guys for granted and the well wishes we have received from you have been much discussed and appreciated all across Lush Towers over the last few days.